This chapter considers how government fiscal policy and the use of market
mechanisms can support a sustainable society. Specific policies are cited, but
by way of example rather than as a blueprint for government policy. As the
discipline of ‘green economics’ described by Cato (2009) gains credibility we
should expect ‘distinctive new solutions’ to emerge (Kennet and Heinemann
2006), influenced by Anderson (2006), Reardon (2007) and others. The New
Economics Foundation, an independent think tank based in the UK, is at the
forefront of attempts to define ‘the new economics’. A powerful critique of
the contradictions in conventional economics has been developed (Boyle and
Simms 2009) but a coherent and workable alternative economic paradigm has
yet to evolve.